Class F 83 

Book. of- 

Copyright^? 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



r 



HHHIS copy of the proceedings at the 
unveiling of Lor ado Taffs "Black 
Hawk" is one of an edition of six hundred 
copies, printed from type, on Holland Van 
Gelder Zonen hand-made paper. 



No. 



Lorado Taffs 
"Black Hawk" 



Ind 



)u!tUC 



Hawk" 



ccount of the Unveiling Cerem* 
at Eagles' Nest Bluff, Oregon, 

Illinois, July the First 
Nineteen Hundred and Eleven 
Frank O. Lowden 



" BLACK HAWK" 
From an etching by Thomas Wood Stevens 



LoradcrTaft's Indian Statue 



"Black Hawk" 

An Account of the Unveiling Ceremonies 
at Eagles' Nest Bluff, Oregon, 

Illinois, July the First 
Nineteen Hundred and Eleven 
Frank O. Lowden 
Presiding 



1912 

University of Chicago Press 
Distributors 



m 



Copyright, 1912 

BY 

WALLACE HECKMAN 



» 



tUfye ILaftesttie ^rcss 
R. R. Donnelley & Sons Co. 
Printers 



&CI.A3270H 



To the Cliff Dwellers 



Foreword 




Foreword 



FROM several aspects this work of Mr. 
Taft's, commonly known as " Black 
Hawk, " seems to enlist interest not likely to 
be casual. It was spontaneous on his part; it 
did itself in his mind. Before it took def- 
inite shape, even in experimental burlap, 
this stately figure, representative of a by- 
gone race, haunted this spot, to him its real 
over-lord, for whose pedestal this crag of 
rock was made. 

The limestone bluff, forming the east bank 
of the Rock River, has a height, where the 
statue stands, of 200 feet, and slopes down- 
ward to the north and eastwardly away from 
it. The figure rises forty-eight feet above 
its natural base. It overlooks the town of 
Oregon, Illinois, located midway between 
Rockford and Dixon. The part of the river 
between the latter cities, a territory some 
forty miles in extent, has, in the most marked 
degree of any, the characteristics which 
caused the Indian tribes to name the river 

[13] 



Foreword 



Sinnissippi (Rock Water). From the site 
of the statue the bluffs, river-bends, islands 
and forest make it the natural center of a 
diversified topography not common in the 
level, fertile corn belt of northern Illinois. 
Ganymede Spring, at the foot of the bluff, 
was so named by Margaret Fuller, then liter- 
ary editor of the New York Tribune, on a 
visit here in 1843, who, under a cedar still 
standing near the statue, wrote one of her 
poems, and, in her interesting "At Home and 
Abroad," gives a vivid glimpse of her outlook 
from there. The people of Oregon, from the 
first a representative American community, 
in turn, out of hospitality to the brilliant 
transcendentalist, named the island of primal 
forest, which the statue commands, Margaret 
Fuller Island. 

For some thirteen years, from each June 
to October, this bluff has been the summer 
home of a congenial group of painters, sculp- 
tors, writers, educators, musicians, architects, 
diverse in activities, but with enough in 
common of general artistic and literary 

[14] 



Foreword 



interest to make "Camp," as they call it, a 
familiar and pleasantly remembered alight- 
ing place for more casual or transitory kin- 
dred spirits. These cherished associations 
held, for one so deeply in earnest as Mr. 
Taft, an appeal intimately personal, which 
took note of every aspect and phase of the 
place, in storm, at sunset, in fragrant June 
blossomings, and autumn color fest, or 
winter etchings and modelings. Local lore 
and legend lent life and meaning — a people 
curiously alien had left there evidences of 
their deep attachment to the locality. His 
sense of the cogency of sculpture in land- 
scape, his resentment of injustice, his ad- 
miration of strength and valor, all tended to 
suggest to this strong, ready champion of 
every victim of injustice, this departing Sac- 
Fox, a lingering representative of his virile, 
individuate race. For here the footprints 
of his tribe are fresh; the poles of his tepee 
recently stood; his graves still remind us of 
him. Here, too, after centuries of resolutely 
defended retreat, at bay at last, the Indian 

[15] 



Foreword 



realized the hopelessness of the conflict and 
surveyed reluctantly, but with unconquered 
spirit, these rich, diversified, smiling, possess- 
able valleys once his. Here his silent forest 
has been invaded in a lifetime by our noisy 
manufacturing center. Here, at Stillman Val- 
ley, he entered upon the Black Hawk War, his 
last stand for the valley of the Mississippi. 

Here, the white man and the Indian con- 
fronted each other — two adverse destinies. 
They could not live each severally his life 
in his own way. Here could be either the 
solitary hunting ground or all invading cities; 
the fishing pool or the factory site; the prairie 
game pasture or the cultivated farm; the 
lone tepee or crowded skyscrapers; the trail 
or the railroad, — but not both. 

History is at last awarding justice to the 
vanquished. Now art approves the verdict 
and pays this tribute to a race which did 
not lie, which kept its treaties; valued friend- 
ship; scorned greed; could be extinguished, 
but not conquered. Having lain fallow for 
centuries, free from enervating activities, 

[i6j 



Foreword 



seasoned and built up by life in the open, 
hardened and inured by breasting the ele- 
ments, the red race possesses, in such of its 
real representatives as are becoming a part 
of our American life, self-reliance, character, 
and intellectual adequacy, fortified by en- 
durance and impregnable composure. We 
have reached a time, which this event may 
fitly mark, when this inheritance is contribut- 
ing to our commonwealth in art, in litera- 
ture, in oratory, in medicine, even in business, 
men who are girt and roadready for the win- 
ning of the highest civil prizes, and seem to 
have and to hold to, as a birthright, that sim- 
plicity in taste and living which has been 
largely and is likely to remain a mark of cul- 
ture and superiority, and a quality of genius. 

A distinguished fellow-sculptor of Mr. 
Taft's — from abroad, — after stating his own 
high opinion of the latter 's place in his 
art, expressed surprise and impatience that 
he should devote his activities to America, 
especially the West. Why not at least 
accept the inviting chair of art offered else- 

[17] 



Forew ord 



where, with its added creative opportunities? 
The query is natural; the answer obvious. 
He is a son of Illinois; her citizen by birth; 
her university is his Alma Mater; her metrop- 
olis his home and opportunity, whose splen- 
did future is a subject for him of abiding 
artistic emotion, the cherished object of his 
creative conceptions. 

All know the steadfast attention which 
he has given to bettering Chicago's civic 
condition through the Art Commission, Poly- 
technic Society, the Art League, the use of 
school buildings for lectures and amusements, 
and his kindred activities. The five thousand 
school children in attendance at the Union 
League Club Washington's Birthday cele- 
bration, at the Auditorium in 1902, are not 
likely to forget the convincing message of 
this undemonstrative man, as, moved by the 
eager response of their youthful enthusiasm, 
he confided to them his thrill of patriotic 
exultation as his eyes met the flag on his re- 
turn from his exile abroad for study and work, 
and as he illumined loyalty and devotion, and 

[18] 



Foreword 



sacrifice to ideals by illustrations fresh from 
his art, the clay model, the clay box and the 
imperishable bronze and marble. Vital to 
him are these impelling visions which make 
him an inspiration to the young men of the 
West, in his and kindred lines, affording him 
delight in their successes even more than in 
his own, prompting his indifference to returns, 
except as they enable him to live in the 
expression of his ideals. 

This daring experiment in his art was hard- 
ly to be looked for from this restrained, con- 
servative defender of its established tradi- 
tions. The reserve in which he cloaks the 
things which deeply move him is not likely 
to suggest his prompt directness and intensity 
in what he does. Across the aisle from him 
one evening, a partially intoxicated frontiers- 
man, with intolerable brutality, ran amuck 
among his own group of babes, while the pale 
wife sat helpless in despair, whereupon this 
gentle artist took the offender's huge bulk 
by the clothes, lifted him into the air and 
fairly flung him into the vestibule of the car, 

[19] 



Fore wo rd 



then quietly returned to his seat and his 
book. The guests of the July day, of which 
this booklet is intended to give an account, 
may permit this somewhat intimate glimpse 
if they chance to recognize several traits 
grouped in it. 

To some the task involved in this produc- 
tion would have been sacrifice. To him 
it was life; his valid response. The arduous, 
painstaking attention, the self-denial and 
disproportionate contribution have given to 
the spot, whose every attractive phase he 
knew and held in fond, even affectionate, 
admiration, to his art which absorbs him, 
to a race whose dauntless spirit challenged 
his respect, to a community to whom he felt 
grateful for their hospitable welcome and 
sympathetic interest, this silent, imperish- 
able tribute. 

As those in attendance knew more or less 
of Mr. Taft's other work, and had some idea 
of its relative merit and importance, this 
record would seem incomplete without some 
reference to it. This will be found in the 

[20] 



Fo reword 



discriminating Appreciation of him by Mr. 
Fuller, with which the proceedings have been 
supplemented. The clear-sighted practiced 
discernment of the writer of it has, however, 
given to it, in addition, a distinct, gratifying 
interest of its own. 

Wallace Heckman 



Ganymede, October 20, 191 1. 



[21] 



THE UNVEILING OF LORADO 
TAFT'S "BLACK HAWK" 



Program of the Exercises 

FRANK O. LOWDEN, Presiding 



POEM: The Pine Forest Speaks - Page 25 
Elia W. Peattie 

ADDRESS: The Indian - - - Page 33 
Edgar A. Bancroft 

RESPONSES: Ohiyesa (Sioux) 

Dr. Charles E. Eastman Page 55 

Wynnogene (Oneida Iroquois) 

Miss Laura M. Cornelius Page 73 

POEM: The Trail Makers - - Page 85 
Hamlin Garland 

REMARKS: Lorado Taft - - Page 95 

CONCLUDING REMARKS - Page 98 
Frank O. Lowden 



FOREWORD : Wallace Heckman Page 1 3 

LORADO TAFT: AN APPRECI- 
ATION: Henry B. Fuller Page 103 
[22] 



roduced by Mr. Heck - 



Mr. Lowden: Ladies and gentlemen, I 
shall try to emulate in brevity my Brother 
Heckman. I have the pleasure of introducing to 
you Mrs. PeaUie i? ^ 

poem, " The Pine Forest," and I will add, for 
the information of those who do not live in this 
vicinity, that this pine forest is situated a few 
miles below us on the other side of the rwer. 

M.RS. l EATTIE! 

THE PINE FOREST OF ILLINOIS SPEAKS 
We are old and wise : — aye, old and free, 



We gave 
Water he c 
Beneath 



skinnedman ; 



THE OUTLOOK FROM THE STATUE 



The Pine Forest 



THE UNVEILING 

Mr. Lowden was introduced by Mr. Heck- 
man. 

Mr. Lowden: Ladies and gentlemen, I 
shall try to emulate in brevity my Brother 
Heckman. I have the pleasure of introducing to 
you Mrs. Peattie, who will read an original 
poem, " The Pine Forest, " and I will add, for 
the information of those who do not live in this 
vicinity, that this pine forest is situated a few 
miles below us on the other side of the river. 

Mrs. Peattie: 

THE PINE FOREST OF ILLINOIS SPEAKS 

We are old and wise — aye, old and free, 

We saga-men of the plains; 
We hold the earth and the sky in fee, 

Ours are the winds and rains. 

We taught our songs to the copper-skinned man ; 

We gave him shelter and fire; 
Water he drew from the stream that ran 

Beneath the tower and spire 
[25] 



The Pine Forest 



Of our castled rocks. He rested here, 

After the hot day's chase; 
And through our branches the dawn-light clear 

Fell on his sleeping face. 

He has vanished quite — we know not how — 

With his arrow and his wier; 
The timid flocks of the men with the plow 

Wander where leaped the deer. 

But we have our friends, tho' we be so old; 

For those we have a place 
Who must face the heat and weather the cold 

And live by nature's grace. 

The little furred creatures our housemates be, 

We entertain the birds, 
The thoughts of the mole, the hopes of the bee 

We set to rhymed words. 

We are the voice for the voiceless ones, 

And he who listens well 
May hear in our mournful unisons 

The grief he dare not tell. 

[26] 



The Pine Forest 



And we have laughter, splendid and wild, 

For those who exult in life; 
We have lyrics to offer to lovers mild, 

For the striving we have strife. 

Call as you will, we can answer you, 

Whether you laugh or mourn, 
For we are the song-smiths, and we knew 

The themes e'er you were born. 

Above your acres of corn and grain, 

We stand, a living choir, 
To put life's prose into rhyme again, 

While the dreams of youth suspire. 

We are old and wise — we are wild and strong, 

Yet the vassals of your will. 
Ye are the masters, for right or wrong: 

We wait upon ye still. 

We who have seen ye come and depart, 
Who have given ye song and shade, 

Should greed or ingratitude enter your heart, 
Must fall with the fall of your blade. 
[27] 



The Pine Forest 



Oh, walk in the night down our scented aisles, 

Your eyes in thankfulness lift 
To where the moon of summer smiles 

Through the branches' toss and shift! 

Or come at dawn when the pale light creeps 

Softly, sweetly alway, 
Through the cloistered gloom of the farthest 
deeps, 

With its holy promise of day. 

Or come from your heavy tasks at noon, 

On our tawny carpets lie; 
The peace of the woods shall be your boon — 

The peace of the earth and sky. 

The roads that wind to the town away 

Convey our friendly call: 
"Come hither, weary brothers, pray; 

Come rest ye, brothers all!" 

Oh, fend for us, that we may still 

Sing on in shine and rain — 
Thrive by your love, live by your will, 

The guardians of your plain. 

[28] 



The Pine Forest 



And we will coax reluctant skies 
To shed their showers for you; 

And make it our benign emprise 
To store the dripping dew. 

Your children's sons shall visions see, 
Adream beneath our shade; 

So shall our debt of fealty 
To you and yours be paid. 



[29] 



The Indian 



Indian 



\\ d T dwdfN l * n%%SLht say trial i fie Vftiiur 
nn this occasion is entirely worthy of the theme 
{ this wondfrful statue by Mr. Taft, which 
we are here to-day to unveil. It is now my 
pleasure to introduce Mr. Edgar A. Bancroft, 
the orator of the day. 

THE INDIAN 
Mr. BancroWT 8 ^ T d$e$ T %ft# Gentlemen: 
All primitive peoples are of absorbing interest, 
because of the light they shed on the origin 
of the human species. They help us to trace 
the slow stages of the emergence of mind 
over animal instinct and cunning, through 
skill and sagacity, into reason and con- 
templation ; and finally into a poetic, artistic 

fancy are unknown. 

When the first Europeans came to Amer 
ica they iound a new race, wnuny. 5 



The Indian 



Mr. Lowden: / might say that the orator 
on this occasion is entirely worthy of the theme 
of this wonderful statue by Mr. Taft, which 
we are here to-day to unveil. It is now my 
pleasure to introduce Mr. Edgar A. Bancroft^ 
the orator of the day. 

THE INDIAN 

Mr. Bancroft: Ladies and Gentlemen: 
All primitive peoples are of absorbing interest, 
because of the light they shed on the origin 
of the human species. They help us to trace 
the slow stages of the emergence of mind 
over animal instinct and cunning, through 
skill and sagacity, into reason and con- 
templation; and finally into a poetic, artistic 
and religious imagination, expressed in a 
written language. Tradition, folk-lore and 
mythology record in dim fashion only the 
childhood of our race. Its origin and in- 
fancy are unknown. 

When the first Europeans came to Amer- 
ica they found a new race, wholly ignorant 

[33] 



The Indian 



of the experiences, the strifes and the customs 
of the rest of the world. They found the 
American Indian, a true child of nature, born, 
as his legends have it, of the Earth, the all- 
nourishing Mother, and the Sun, the all- 
vivifying Father; a simple race that roamed 
the woods and the prairies, camping where 
the night found them, living freely their 
individual lives, little influenced or restrain- 
ed by authority or the power or pressure of 
numbers. The rigors of climate, the mastery 
of wild animals and trees and plants, for food 
and raiment and shelter, made them strong 
and self-reliant. Like the wild fowl and the 
bison, they journeyed and lodged in ever- 
changing groups, supplying their daily needs 
wherever they were, and always at home, no 
matter how widely they fared. Thus came 
courage, self-mastery and more than Spartan 
hardiness. 

Beyond all other races they developed 
man's physical powers and had a full natural 
equipment for all emergencies of the wilder- 
ness life. Skillful, hardy, enduring, they 

[34] 



The Indian 



needed not our weapons and tools to sup- 
plement their strength and prowess. Their 
keenness and quickness of perception have 
been matched by the white man only in fancy 
and fiction. We imaginatively contrive the 
detective skill that the Indian had and ex- 
ercised in his daily life. Though he had no 
written language, the various tribes had 
created their own Esperanto; and wherever 
he went he read unerringly the sign language 
written in spoor and bitten leaf, in broken 
twig and bending sapling, and in the gestures 
of the stranger. Camping here and there he 
needed a city no more than the antelope or 
the beaver. He knew how to find in nature 
food, weapons, medicines and countless aids 
and allies. The mysterious and useful prop- 
erties of every tree and plant from root to 
leaf were his best inheritance. Knowledge 
of them came out of the unknown past, as 
did he himself. 

"It seemed as if the breezes brought him, 
It seemed as if the sparrows taught him, 
As if by secret sign he knew 
Where in far fields the orchis grew." 

[35] 



The Indian 



Though he sometimes had so-called vil- 
lages, and even federations, these were un- 
certain, often remote and transitory. It was 
at the council fire or in the circle of braves, 
beneath the sky, that his fortunes were most 
influenced. Leadership came by demon- 
strated ability; by the wisdom and virtue 
to lead. He had what men in all times have 
admired as the attribute of heroes: self- 
sufficiency for every condition. He was ready 
without warning or preparation, and he was 
unflinching in the face of death. Unlike 
his masterful white brother, he was modest 
and reserved, and of few words. Vanity 
and posing were foreign to his nature. His 
dignity and simplicity compelled the admira- 
tion of all historians, friendly and hostile. 

When the Pilgrims from the old world 
found these people it was like going back to 
the Garden of Eden or to that fair place in 
Mesopotamia. It was indeed a Garden of 
Eden, where primitive man seemed still fresh 
from the hands of the Creator. But how 
did the intruders regard him? We excavate 

[36] 



The Indian 



the earlier homes of our race in distant Asia 
or Africa to find some blurred marks on 
broken stone — some relics of that far dis- 
tant day. We search the dust-heaps of the 
past for records of aboriginal peoples; yet 
on this continent, unspoiled by cities, or by 
the arts and vices of civilization, was such 
a race, which had won, unaided, "dominion 
over the beasts of the field and the fowls of 
the air." But the first-comers perceived 
none of this. They saw only simple savages 
who had furs and maize and beans and pota- 
toes, which the white men sorely needed in 
the early days when winter or hunger im- 
periled their lives. But when the numbers 
of the pioneers had grown and their days of 
danger and need had passed, they saw the 
Indian blocking their path, holding beautiful 
valleys and plains they coveted. And that 
their selfish interest might not lack religious 
sanction, they called him a pagan that re- 
sisted their religious belief — for he held 
only a child's faith in the Great Spirit. 
They found here also a race of orators — 
[37] 



The Indian 



quiet, laconic, wise, dramatic and picturesque; 
orators like Logan and Red Jacket, Tecumseh 
and Keokuk, who spoke wisdom, who spoke 
power, with action suited to the word. With- 
in the memory of men still living such ora- 
tors have stood forth for their tribes, like 
yon heroic image, to answer the request or 
the demand of the Great Father at Wash- 
ington. On such an occasion in Iowa, scarce 
a generation ago, the chief said: "You 
came a few years ago proposing treaty; you 
found my people thus" — wrapping his tall, 
lithe form closely in its buffalo robe, stand- 
ing erect, and facing with firm gaze the 
messenger, as that figure stands to-day. 
"You came proposing treaty, and you found 
my people thus. We treated with you; we 
signed your paper; we gave part of our lands. 
And now my people are thus" — throwing 
wide his hands, the great robe fell from him, 
and he stood, like his tribe, neglected, naked, 
his people scattered and overcome. 

This race was poetic without a written 
language; it found poetry in all the phenomena 

[38] 



The Indian 



of nature — in the colors of sunrise and sun- 
set, in the shadows of clouds, and the deep 
glooms of storm and night. The hues of 
foliage and of the wild life appealed to them, 
and in their pottery, blankets, and by the 
coverings of their tepees they showed these 
colors, or told in rude drawings the controll- 
ing incidents of their simple lives. Is there 
not poetry in a people whose word for "beau- 
tiful" has this caressing sound — "lolomei"? 

Their weakness in contending with the 
great forces of nature — the tornado, snow, 
and the lightning, and the fearful mysteries 
of disease — made them a thoughtful and 
religious race. These mysterious and ter- 
rible phenomena were the gods of their re- 
ligion. The majesty of the storm, the roar 
of the winds, and the lightning and the thun- 
der — these all spoke to them of forces above 
and beyond them, as the stars and the moon 
and the sun have spoken through all the 
ages, — not of forces malign, but of friend- 
ly powers, ever present to aid and protect 
them. Out of their simple experience and 

[39] 



The Indian 



education, in the school of nature, grew a 
race, -strong, virile, resourceful, sagacious, 
brave and true; with its own story of its 
origin, with its own explanation of the mys- 
teries of the natural world. 

Their folklore attributed the Flood to the 
folly of man, and not to the anger of the 
Great Spirit. Their explanation of the Milky 
Way, by a story of the coyote dragging the 
stolen bag of stars across the blue vault of 
Night, after opening its corner to see what 
it contained, probably answers the question, 
"How came the stars there?" as well as any 
of our ancestors could. In their religion 
there was no fall, but only, and always, a 
rising. With them evil was never the major 
good, nor intolerance the proof of piety. 
They went, care-free and unafraid, into the 
pathless woods and across the shoreless seas 
of waving grass and flowers. The moun- 
tains were not forbidding to them; the wild 
animals, small and large, were their kins- 
men; and the Great Spirit — Manitou — 
dwelt everywhere. Their pantheism was 

[40] 



The Indian 



more simple and more sincere than the 
Greeks', and their stoicism was more genuine. 

Their faith taught the fatherhood of God 
and the brotherhood of man But their 
chiefs and medicine-men had never made a 
class which attempted to monopolize God, 
or limit brotherhood by tests of color, customs 
or dogma. Even the best of our immigrants, 
the Puritans, proclaiming liberty to worship 
and freedom from oppression, showed the 
quality of their brotherhood by mistreating, 
murdering and robbing their red brothers; 
their brotherhood was a narrow one, as 
Hooker and Roger Williams soon found. The 
Indian's was universal in fact. The Great 
Spirit he worshiped was the All-Father, 
and taught him kindliness and fidelity, not 
only to the Indian, but to the white brother 
as well. 

Our ancestors came here, and should have 
mingled in friendship with this race of such 
basic virtues; simple dignity, self-mastery 
and quiet courage. Instead of that, the 
whites were overbearing, distrustful, covetous 

[41] 



The Indian 



and contemptuous. The two races met in 
antagonism or joined in debasing warfare, or 
plunder or vices. The Indian freely offered 
us the winnings of the chase, and those prod- 
ucts of the soil which he had developed 
here. He offered us his simple art in weav- 
ing blankets and baskets, his pottery, and all 
the rude implements and weapons effective 
for his time and needs. We gave him hand- 
fuls of trinkets for domains greater than 
any king has owned. We gave him a few 
bright stuffs for valleys beyond price. We 
ignored his simple virtues. We thrust 
upon him our destructive vices. We made 
treaties — and we broke them. We met in 
solemn, peaceful conclave, and then, having 
won his confidence, we betrayed it. Through 
three centuries the history of the Indian and 
the European is the history of the fidelity 
on the part of the Indian and perfidy on the 
part of the white race. No treaty was ever 
strong enough to hold us. They were chil- 
dren in all barter, because the things they 
had were largely held in common. They 

[42] 



The Indian 



had no accumulations of useless things, and 
so no envy, or greed, or dishonesty. They 
lacked that skillful self-seeking so essential 
to business success. They did not know the 
value of their possessions. They had enough; 
what one had all were welcome to. Their 
hospitality was wholly generous — a tribute 
of man to man. Where they lodged was food 
and shelter for any red man passing that way, 
or any white man who came in need, or in 
friendly spirit. 

And yet the Government of the United 
States meant well toward this wonderful, 
primitive people. Our policy was right in 
motive, but wrong in method and administra- 
tion. It dealt with them as wards, but it 
dealt with them en masse; keeping them to- 
gether, their land was a large and ever-covet- 
ed possession. We began by treating with 
them as independent tribes or nations; but 
soon drove them like cattle from the lands 
we had solemnly guaranteed to them forever. 
We did not patiently and consistently seek 

[43 1 



The Indian 



their development through the individual, by 
personal helpfulness and sympathy. 

Our great Christian Anglo-Saxon race has 
shown only ruthless power to the Indian, 
while the Spaniard and the Frenchman have 
Christianized him. When King Philip was 
finally hunted to his death, how to deal with 
his youthful son was mercifully referred to the 
clergymen of Massachusetts Bay. After ear- 
nest consideration, they reported that it would 
be right to kill him. But they finally sent 
him to the West Indies. 

When we send out teachers, to educate 
and civilize the Indian, the fundamental 
condition is that the teacher shall not know 
nor learn the language of his wards. Our 
custom is to regard our clothes, and our 
implements, and our food, and our housing, 
as the sum of our civilization. Can we cut 
the bonds of human sympathy thus, and 
trample upon all their sacred rites and 
customs, and keep a barrier between the 
Indian and the white teacher, and then 
expect the civilizing power of a dominant 

[44] 



The Indian 



race to commend itself to that simple people? 
In the heart of the Arizona Desert, I 
awoke one morning to the sound of musical 
voices like the warbling of birds;- they were 
the voices of the Hopi women coming down 
five hundred feet of steep path to carry back 
their stone jars of water to their homes, 
upon the lofty mesa. Strange that in that 
hot desert those gentle savages should pre- 
fer their stone houses, with thatched roofs, 
high upon the wind-swept mesa, to the frame 
cabins, with iron roofs, which the Great 
White Father builds for them on the sand. 

Instead of meeting the Indian upon a 
common basis of humanity; instead of ob- 
serving his ethnic value, and dealing kindly 
with him, we have considered him only a 
savage. As old Ben Franklin, the wisest 
man yet born this side the Atlantic, said: 
"Savages we call them, because their manners 
differ from ours, which we think the per- 
fection of civility, and they think the same 
of theirs." Savages? Yes, they did many 
savage deeds. They wrought many bloody 

[45] 



The Indian 



pages in the history of our country. But 
why? You and I have lived long enough 
to answer why. The Indian wars of our 
time we know, and, the records prove, were 
cruel, needless wars; if our soldiers won, it 
was without honor; if the Indians won, it 
was without hope. 

Once, when General Crook was leaving 
upon an Indian campaign, a friend said to 
him: "It is too bad you are going out in 
the hot summer, into the Western desert, on 
such an enterprise." And General Crook 
answered, "Yes, it is too bad; but the worst 
of it is that I am going against a people who, 
I know, are in the right." 

At Hampton one day a lady of thought- 
less curiosity, observing among the girls 
in that school one of swarthy complexion, 
approached her and said, "Are you an In- 
dian?" And the maiden very simply re- 
plied, "Yes." "And are you civilized?" 
the lady asked, and again the maiden quiet- 
ly answered, "Yes; are you?" 

[46] 



The Indian 



General Miles was once entertained at 
Hampton, and some of the most exemplary 
boys in the school were brought forward to 
greet him. As they came forward, one In- 
dian boy passed the General with his hands 
behind him. He was at once ordered to his 
room for this strange conduct. When later 
an explanation was demanded as to why he 
had refused to shake hands with the great 
general of the American army, he answered: 
"I couldn't shake hands with the man who 
killed my father. " 

When Ouray, the Ute chief, visited Carl 
Schurz, then Secretary of the Interior, he 
brought his wife, Chepata, with him; and 
the Secretary was so pleased with them, that 
he asked them to his home in Washington. 
Some years afterward the great chief died, 
and his widow sent this message to Mr. 
Schurz, through the Indian agent: "My hus- 
band never forgot the kindness you showed 
us in Washington. Now that he is dead, 
I wish to send you the things I value most, 
his powder horn and his tobacco pouch; and 

[47] 



The Indian 



this I will do, if you will accept them with- 
out making any return, because you know 
this is a gift of friendship, and I cannot 
make it unless you will treat it so." 

When General Grant sent a gift to Chief 
Washtenaw, the bearer waited to hear what 
message should be returned to the President. 
Washtenaw gathered his warriors about him, 
and, standing forth, he said to the messenger: 
"Washtenaw feels thankful in his heart. 
The Indian always feels a kindness there. 
The white man feels it in his head and can 
speak his thanks because the head has a 
tongue; the Indian cannot, because the heart 
has no tongue. " 

Do we admire heroism? On what fields 
has greater heroism been displayed than in 
many of our Indian wars — early and late — 
when, in defense of ancestral lands, the red 
men, with bows and arrows or inferior arms, 
fought trained soldiers to the death? The 
language of King Philip's early biographer 
fits many a leader among them: "He fought 
and fell — miserably, indeed, but gloriously 

[48] 



The Indian 



— the avenger of his own household, the 
worshiper of his own gods, the guardian 
of his own honor, a martyr for the soil which 
was his birthplace, and for the proud liberty 
which was his birthright." 

We meet, however, not to recall this more 
than a century of dishonor, so much as to 
recall the character and simplicity and fidel- 
ity, the courage and poise and native dignity 
of these sons of the virgin soil. We meet to 
celebrate, here and now, the union of this 
past heroism with a high and noble art, which 
out of that heroism can portray and preserve 
its epic, its tragic greatness. 

There the sculptor has placed, imperish- 
ably, the Indian; not sullen, not resentful, 
not despondent, not surrendering; but simple, 
unflinching, erect; with the pathos of his 
past in his face, the tragedy of the future in 
his eyes; but with the dauntless courage of 
a man in his. whole figure and attitude. 

In this sublime art, there is no uncertainty 
of line, no mere suggestion that loses itself 
in mystic significance, which many have 

[49] 



The Indian 



sought in their separate ways. This is not 
of that symbolic art which tries to suggest 
what it is not competent to portray. As in 
the Moses of Michael Angelo and the Lin- 
coln of Saint Gaudens, so here, in the Indian 
of Lorado Taft, there is seen the man, not 
alone in his figure and features, but the man 
as he was in his very heart and soul. Many 
artists have painted, sketched, and modeled 
an Indian. Only to-day, the artist has 
created, forevermore, the Indian. 

We can read a tragedy there, but it is a 
tragedy that does not depress, that does not 
appeal for your sympathies; it is a hopeless 
fight, but not a surrender; it is a lost cause, 
but not a lost leader. It stands there, not 
only as a monument to a simple, kindly, 
faithful, virile race, but, also, I hope, as a 
reminder to those of a different blood of the 
perfidy which marked our contact with them 
throughout their history. I trust it stands 
there, not merely to rebuke our sins of the 
past, but to point the way to a different and 

[50] 



The I?idian 



far more humane and intelligent treatment 
of this noble race. 

To-day we read the first page in the last 
of the priceless books of the Sibyl. Shall 
we let that last book be destroyed, as the 
others have been; or shall we see that the rem- 
nants of this race, which has developed char- 
acter, courage and all the traits that we rec- 
ognize as the marks of men, are worthy of 
something better than to be put out upon 
the desert spots of our country, to be given 
only such portions of their own heritage as 
we can not use? Shall we not look upon 
them as they are, a newer, a fresher, a stronger 
race than ours, capable of bringing to us their 
virtues, if we greet them as they greeted the 
men of the old world? They still possess 
value to us, and this country still has oppor- 
tunity for them. 

Let not their virtues die; and let not our 
justice longer sleep! 



[si] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



Response — Ohiyesa 



Mr. Lowden: It is now my pleasure to 
introduce Ohiyesa of the Sioux (Dr. Charles E. 
Eastman), who will make a response to Mr. 
Bancroft's address. 

Ohiyesa: Ladies and Gentlemen, and 
Mr. Bancroft: The sentiment you pre- 
sent to-day is worthy of the occasion, the 
true trail of the race you speak of to-day. 
I have appreciated all that is worthy of 
knowing in the wonderful and brilliant prog- 
ress of modern civilization. While I have 
seen all that you have acquired in your en- 
lightenment, your laboratory, your electri- 
city, your chemistry, and your wonderful 
mechanical development and machinery, I 
have not once lost my head and forgotten 
that which was put into my very soul by 
an untutored woman, with the help of nature. 
I have known what is beauty. I have known 
what is justice. I have known what is wrong. 
I have known all the beauty of living and 
being in perfect harmony with any human 

[55] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



soul that would enter my tepee or shed. It 
was put into my soul by one who claimed no 
Christian teaching, by one who knew nothing 
of that concrete knowledge that ages have 
accumulated. Only every morning, stand- 
ing before the sun in the pure air, she be- 
held the trees and flowers, the prairies and 
rivers, and tried to feel in herself the wonder 
and beauty of His love. She, who observed 
in every rock and every tree, in fact in every 
phase of nature, that pervading power of 
life, that quickening sweet love of Him who 
poured His blessing upon everything from 
lowest to highest development and thing, 
without discriminating. He who pours out 
His blessing on all is the only example we 
have. Why should we recognize any other, 
or say we are the only pebbles on the shore? 

We are quick to feel that death is not far 
off if we do not have a meal for three days. 
We all scream if we have a toothache. This 
human body is weak, and strength and in- 
telligence are accumulated by these limitations 
of that which is supreme, that the native 

[56] 



Response — Ohtyesa 



Indian loved so well. He taught us these 
beauties, in His sunshine and His quickening 
love, and that beyond is a life infinitely 
beautiful to come. But we cannot speculate 
upon that if, when we are ready to enter, 
He send us back or send us somewhere else. 
(Applause.) 

Why, the Indians say, it is He who gives me 
this beautiful world and can give me a more 
infinitely beautiful abode. It is His business 
— I cannot infringe upon it. I trust Him 
forever. 

He, who stood against the tree in prayer- 
ful attitude at sunrise and at sunset, and saw 
the beautiful river flowing down the green 
valley, was conscious of His love and observed 
these beauties in life — he was not a mere 
untutored savage. He, whom this day we 
have met to commemorate by this monu- 
ment, was not a common man. He was not 
a steerage passenger from Hungary, or other 
Slav state. (Applause.) Neither was he a 
half-breed of all mixtures that come from 
abroad. He was a child of long lineage of 

[57] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



that simplicity of life who understood what 
life was; who was taught never to say, 
"This is mine"; who was taught never to 
let a man go hungry when he had a mouth- 
ful left; who was taught to run fifty miles 
for a friend or stranger, and not turn round 
and ask, "How much am I going to get for 
this?" He, who would do any kind act to 
any stranger, was not an untutored savage. 
He had no books, at least not human-made 
books, but he knew the great mysteries to 
himself printed on these trees and rocks and 
rivers. They had a sermon for him, morn- 
ing and evening. He who stood, as this 
monument shall stand, was not a heathen: 
he, who never knew a hell or had a devil 
in him, until the missionaries came here. 
(Applause.) 

He was a child of nature, he was generous- 
ly treated by the Almighty, and he wants 
to be the same to everybody. He, whose 
warfare was as a game of football — for 
fun. They knew no other, until the white 
man came to Christianize the Indians, and 

[58] 



Response — 



Ohiyesa 



butchered them in the woods. And, when 
ten thousand Indians were brought together 
and butchered, it was a congregation of 
religion. It was the works of religion. They 
came to convert the Indians, they said, and 
it seemed they had to butcher them as soon 
as they converted them. They were not 
horrified by those deeds and scenes. They 
saw the work done. History makes apologies 
for them. 

But we understood— we had human hearts. 
We loved our homes, our valleys and our 
prairies — but we had no business here. 
We had no civilization. You had plenty 
of it, my brothers, and the more you have 
the more you're afraid of your brother, and 
the more strong doors you have, the more 
strong locks, the more policemen to protect 
you. It is one of the most wonderful things 
to the Indian: the more civilized you are, 
the more you cannot trust your brother. 
We cannot understand it, when you have 
that most superb injunction, that golden 
rule of Christ; and in fact there is no race I 

[S9l 



Response — 



Ohiyesa 



know lives closer to that golden rule than 
the Indians themselves, and I have often 
thought, when I see your civilization, that 
Christ was an Indian and not a white man. 
(Applause.) Because civilization has a differ- 
ent method than he. 

In your civilization you have competition. 
What is competition? Nothing but gam- 
bling. You say, "I do not tell how I sell 
to my neighbor." If you can beat the other 
fellow out of five cents, you do it. You com- 
bine and make the trusts, and then you stand 
and cry out against them. What are you 
going to do about it? What have you done 
with the things the Indians loved, the maize 
they had? Innocent cereal it was. But 
what has become of the Indian maize? All 
gone into barrels. What wonderful civiliza- 
tion you have, what heads for business! You 
preach against the evils of whiskey, and 
keep on raising the innocent cereals and 
manufacturing whiskey of it at the same 
time. You are the most wonderful half- 

[60] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



breeds we Indians have ever known; made of 
contradictions from head to foot. 

I shall never forget the time when a num- 
ber of chiefs went into Chicago with me, 
fifteen or sixteen years ago. As we were 
going up the street from the station, one 
stopped me and said, "But, little one, where 
in the world are these people fleeing to on the 
Chicago street? What wolf is behind them?" 
And I said, "No wolf behind them; the al- 
mighty dollar is in front of them!" (Ap- 
plause.) 

Another chief stopped before we crossed 
the street and gave a grunt. I said, "What 
is the trouble?" And he said, "After these 
people are dead three years, they are still 
walking." Wonderful observation they have 
looking into a man's eye, and they under- 
stand the character of the person in a flash. 

I pointed to the windows of one of the 
skyscrapers, and I said, "There are hundreds 
of rooms up there back of those windows, 
and hundreds of people in there working 
hard; some with hair turned gray; some- 

[61] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



times it comes off entirely. Their cheeks 
turn ashy, their eyes not quite so clear as 
they were, but there they are; that is their 
business, and they become and look old be- 
fore their time, but really they are lovely 
people." 

Then again, just before we crossed State 
street, one chief turned around and gave a 
grunt. I stopped and asked, "What is the 
trouble?" And he said, "I think I saw a 
little girl with false teeth." I said, "No 
wonder! See how they run and push. They 
get crushed, their limbs are broken, maybe 
cut off, eyes put out, teeth put out, but they 
can get others, and it is a most wonderful 
thing, they look better than the old ones." 
The best leg a man can have is the one that 
is manufactured. They go to an office and 
a man puts in an eye, in place of the old 
one, that is clearer and bluer, whether he 
can see with it or not. He can get a set of 
teeth, more beautiful than the old pair, and, 
in fact, if you examine the white man from 
head to foot, the chances are you will find 

[62] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



he is pretty much made up. (Applause.) 
A few of that Indian tribe that was brought 
up in Peoria saw the morning sun rise above 
the river, saw the evening sun set, saw the 
delicate tinted cloud and in the evening saw 
the moon and stars, and through those lights 
he saw the spirit of the earth, and knew 
instinctively that he was but a molecule, an 
atom in this world, and felt that he must be 
in harmony with the rest of the molecules 
and with the spirit of the world, and he al- 
ways tries to be so, always looking up to the 
spirit above. 

Even if you should go to the Indian reser- 
vation at this time, at the Fourth of July, 
and see the Indians make celebration, gather- 
ing together from their tepees, you would 
see the old Indian, standing exactly like that 
monument stands, looking over the vast 
valleys of the Des Moines. There he stands 
in silent prayer. He is not a man who prays 
in words. The Great Spirit knows our every 
thought. He needs no words of human 
communication, no articulation. He who 

[63] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



sees you in every attitude and mood needs 
no shouting to know your wants. You 
must be in child-like simplicity, and have 
no false modesty about you, but stand be- 
fore him as a child and let him grant your 
needs. You, when you pray, ask two or 
three hundred things in a minute. The 
Indian does not ask anything. 

Standing so absolutely silent there, he 
sees the whole beauty of this world and his 
love in every phase of nature shines. He 
fears nothing. He cares nothing for hunger 
and physical hardships. If he brings in his 
deer in January, dragging it behind him with 
frosty hands, the first thing he asks his wife 
is, "Are the other hunters successful?" And 
if she answers no, he says, "Divide the deer; 
distribute it among the tepees and keep only 
a kettleful." Where in the world can you 
find a more literal following out of the prin- 
ciples of that wonderful preacher along the 
shores of Galilee? You have your philan- 
thropists, with their surplus of money. You 
do not sacrifice anything. There are many 

[6 4 ] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



of you pure Christians, but, as a race, you 
have practices that take away a great deal 
of devotion. The Indian is on the same 
trail as you are. We are becoming Ameri- 
canized, but we pray we may save some of 
this original honesty, and in this great nation- 
al life at Washington, show you the politics 
of an honest people. (Applause.) A won- 
derful love of their country, and their gov- 
ernment, you American people have, and 
still springs up in your hearts when those 
who are in the government's service can 
show that they have been sent there at duty's 
call, and not on a pile of grafting and taint- 
ed money. 

Did you ever see or hear the duty call of 
the Sioux Indian at midnight, whether in 
January, February or July; in the cool mid- 
night hear, " Brave Hawk, you are needed 
at the Council!" Brave Hawk may be 
asleep; maybe, his wife is wakened by the 
call, and rouses him. He gets up and wraps 
up in his robe, as the monument stands to- 
day, walks across the campus in front of 

[65] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



the circular rows of tepees. He utters not 
a word. He stands before the Council — 
still not a word. A drum is struck, and 
perhaps one will get up and dance. There 
stands Brave Hawk. He says not a word. 
The pipe is held up to him and he takes four 
puffs. The drum strikes again. The chief 
of the Council speaks: " Brave Hawk, you 
are required to run to-night, up and down, 
over the country, probably sixty or seventy- 
five miles, and report to-morrow night." 
He doesn't turn around and ask, "How 
much am I to get for this?" He cannot. 
It is duty's call. He goes back to his tepee 
and says, "Wife, give me an extra pair of 
moccasins." He may need an extra pair. 
If he is not married, his mother will wait 
on him and tie them to his belt. He throws 
away all extra garments, and, without a 
sound, he disappears in the darkness. He 
is gone all night and the next day, and some 
time the next night you hear him singing, 
maybe on the hill. Immediately the drum 
is struck. He is ushered in. He has scoured 

[66] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



all the surrounding country; watched every- 
thing; saw how the buffalo were moving and 
how the enemy was moving. There was 
no necessity for lying or falsifying; noth- 
ing to be gained. His honor was called 
upon. He has executed his duty. He has 
answered duty's call, and it was so in all 
times. This man, from childhood, had been 
trained to be a man, in the most noble sense 
of the word, as Mr. Bancroft has well de- 
scribed. In fact, he has stolen my oration. 
I have to make one up as I go along. He 
took all my speech, and I have to make 
one up. 

The Indians were a noble people. Their 
characteristics are expressive of this hill and 
winding river. Over the spreading prairies 
of Illinois, into the Mississippi Valley, 
across the river, and to the Rockies farther 
west, the white man pushed them. And 
here was Black Hawk, in the bosom of this 
most fertile valley. He had imbibed this 
very pure air, not quite so pure now; this 
pure water, then not so contaminated as it 

[67] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



is now. Here he was nurtured by untutored 
parents and Nature. She took him in her 
lap and showed him the wilderness with all 
its rough virtues. He took them into his 
soul and needed no more wonderful civiliza- 
tion. 

When the crisis came Keokuk, chief of 
the Sacs, supposed to be good, big Indian, 
who has good recommendation paper, and 
that sort of thing — Keokuk fled and left 
the valley to the white man. Then Black 
Hawk was heard calling upon the Potta- 
wotamies and the Winnebagoes, to help him 
defend the land he loved. When they came 
to him he said he never would have signed 
Rock River away, and you must fight 
for it. There they had touched a sensitive 
ground. He loved the graves of his father 
and mother, these corn fields and this beau- 
tiful valley. This was his natural shrine. 
He often stood here, as this monument shall 
stand forever, calling upon him who never 
denies the Indian. He fought for his country 
and he fought to his sorrow, for these sneaks, 

[68] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



the Pottawotamies and Winnebagoes, de- 
serted him within a month and left him with 
a handful of men to hold the whole valley, 
and went up into Wisconsin. Finally he 
fled across the Mississippi, when the Sioux, 
my own tribe, joined the white soldiers and 
crossed the Mississippi. 

This man had misfortunes pile upon him, 
and when worse and worse came, he gave 
himself up and stoically said to the Winne- 
bagoes, "Do as you please with me. Brave 
Black Hawk shall not shed any tears." And 
the sneaking Winnebagoes took him over to 
the military officers, and probably got their 
old military suits with their bright buttons, 
out of it, by delivering Black Hawk to them. 

Such was the treatment he received. 
Through it all he stood, with the courage 
and manhood so typical of his race, and so 
I feel thankful to-day, fellow-citizens, that 
this brave, simple and deserving hero has 
been honored by this monument — ■ a monu- 
ment to his honor — and I feel sure that 
no intelligent North American Indian can 

[69] 



Response — Ohiyesa 



fail to appreciate such a tribute to one of 
my race. 

This monument shall stand, as every 
day, no doubt, Black Hawk himself stood, 
in silent prayer to the Great Master at 
sunrise and at sunset. So may this monu- 
ment stand in silent prayer, proclaiming, 
to generations to come, that after all we are 
children of the same Maker, and we are all 
brothers. (Applause.) 



[70] 



Response — Wynnogene 



Response — Wynnogene 



Mr. Lowden: / now have the very great 
pleasure of introducing Wynnogene of the 
Oneida-Iroquois (Miss Laura M. Cornelius), 
who will make a further response to Mr, 
Bancroft's address. 

Wynnogene: Like the faint whispers of 
the last leaf upon the oak, when the north- 
west winds have done with summer, is 
the Indian's message to you. The ancient 
oracles are still. For him, even the golden 
glory of October's sun is set. No eagle 
plumes wave before my eyes as I look 
among you. The race is not here to-day. 
The race is not here, to rejoice with me for 
this great moment. And perhaps I may be 
pardoned that my vision grows dim as I 
look upon this mute magnificence before 
us, — dim because 

"Tears from the depth of some divine despair 
Rise in the heart and gather to the eyes, 
In . . . thinking of the days that are no more." 

And dim, too, because this beautiful tribute, 

so long delayed to a deserving people, comes 

[73 3 



Response — Wy nnogene 



at last so freely given, so nobly conceived, 
so grandly memorial. 

While it is with deep thanksgiving that 
I am thus privileged to represent the Ameri- 
can Indian on this occasion, I have accepted 
this lofty honor with a profound regret that 
a Red Jacket, a Dehoadilun, or an Oskanun- 
dunah is not here to immortalize in fitting 
speech an event which is the first of its kind 
in America, — an event to which the Ameri- 
can Angle, no less than the Indian, must 
point with pride and gratitude in his heart 
as time mellows the pages of our history. 

For my part, I cannot think of anything 
more long-enduring, more grand in its signif- 
icance, or more sublime in spirit than that 
which has the power to warm the hearts of 
two races in a common inspiration. The 
American Revolution was such an influence, 
and the hazardous frontier. Indeed, it is 
not so long ago since the oppressed of other 
lands stood side by side upon our shores 
tingling to their temples in the glow of a 
common purpose. It is not so long ago since 

[74] 



Response — Wy n no gene 



the dangers of the wilderness beyond the 
Alleghanies gave birth to the real American 
Nation, no longer dependent upon the frontier 
of Europe for their initiative. But to-day it 
is not war, not the unbroken path in the 
wilderness, not the thirst in the desert, not 
the loneliness of the open plain, nor the 
treacherous pass of the mountain that bind 
us together. Wars and frontier are gone. 
The sentiments are growing out of other 
things: out of interests that, mayhap, are 
more universal in their appeal; sentiments 
that go beyond the immediate self and are 
made of the larger sympathies for all men. 
Let me quote one of your literary artists, 
who says: 

"The modern sympathy includes not only 
the power to pity the sufferings of others, 
but also that of understanding their very 
souls." This is the sympathy which has 
brought us so pleasantly together here. This 
the sympathy which alone can make the 
past redeemable. This the sympathy that 
mothers the Arts. And lo, in its wake the 

[75] 



Response — Wy nnogene 



earth grows more beautiful to the eye. How 
your poet has here caught an insight into the 
very soul of the Indian! How, with that 
kind of feeling which comes as the flowering 
of a people's culture, he has made of this 
place in the wood a Mecca to the lover of 
Art! To-day I have come to feel, in a de- 
gree I never before felt, that the American 
people may enter a large claim for worldly 
recognition in that art which is the hardest 
of the Fine Arts to attain, Sculpture. 

You may recall how, some years ago, a Brit- 
ish statesman and scholar asked, " Where 
are your American poets?" I cannot ques- 
tion the definition of poetry in the Briton's 
mind when he asked that question. Nor can 
I here discuss with you the relative merits 
of our own sweet singers. Sufficient to say 
that, while one must admit the wild imagina- 
tion of Poe and the rugged profundity of 
Whitman, he cannot compare them, or the 
gentle race of the New England fireside poets, 
with the laureled bards of the Aegean or 
British Isles. And, however much of beau- 
ty ] 



Response — Wynnogene 



tiful song has been produced in this country, 
the fact remains that, before Homer and 
Milton, we must admit that in the whole 
history of the American nation there has 
yet been no conception that, in sublimity of 
theme, in dignity of treatment, in fidelity 
to atmosphere, can be called the American 
Epic. 

But now what is this carving in stone, 
whose every line is full of the stately measure 
of the Epic? What is this story, whose 
silent eloquence melts the heart as you look 
upon it? 

"Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time, 
Sylvan historian who canst thus express 
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: 

What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 
Of deities or mortals, or of both?" 

Done in a medium which has the first place 

in the esthetic hierarchy. Done to endure, 

as no other of the Fine Arts, the ravages of 

Time. Oh, I care not what the canons may 

be that divide one Fine Art from another. 

The Indian honored the prophet when he 

came. So let him alway, whether that 

[77] 



Response — Wy nno gene 



prophet carry in his hand the brush, the quill, 
or the chisel. 

To me this Statue has gone beyond the 
limitations of speech. It has long passed 
the bounds of verbal expression. Were its 
essence to take other forms, I am certain 
we should hear in it the strains of beautiful 
music. Within its idealism is locked a great 
oratorio. Naught but the solemn harmony 
of some deep-toned sacred music could carry 
its meaning. 

And perhaps, too, were we to look closer, 
we should find its noble lines returning to 
the boundaries of inland seas and crescent 
moon, or back to the stateliness of cathedral 
elm, — find its hopes sailing the cloud-flecked 
blue overhead, its heroism leaping preci- 
pice and break with the daredom of the 
awful Tawasentha Niagara. Aye, the spirit 
that has been caught in this marble mold 
is as large as Nature itself. If this is not the 
American Epic, I ask what can be? 

Rightly is its subject the American Indian. 
He who knows the throes of a Gethsemane. 

[78] 



Response — Wynno gene 



He who knows the blood-sweat of anguish. 
He who has sounded the very depths of a 
national tragedy, and done it after the teach- 
ings of his fathers, without a murmur. He 
who, too spiritual to survive the ravages of 
a material age, has been misunderstood and 
has passed under the ignominy of false 
charges. He who, like the Greek, belonged 
to a hero age they could not comprehend. 
Yet when all is done, calmly he draws his 
simple robe about him and stands there 
mute and upright, looking boldly back upon 
it all, even as the eagle faces the glaring 
sun. Looking back to the East. Aye, even 
back to the welcome lodges of his fathers, 
surveying the past, as one who has finished 
the journey of life. How recently he him- 
self stood there, with these words upon his 
lips: 

"Beautiful is the sun, O strangers, 
When you come so far to see us. 
All our town in peace awaits you, 
All our doors stand open for you: 
You shall enter all our wigwams, 
For the heart's right hand we give you. 

[79l 



Response — Wynnogene 



Never bloomed the earth so gayly, 
Never shone the sun so brightly, 
As to-day they shine and blossom, 
When you come so far to see us. 
Never was our lake so tranquil, 
Nor so free from rock and sand-bar, 
For your birch-canoe in passing 
Has removed both rock and sand-bar. 
Never before had our tobacco 
Such a sweet and pleasant flavor, 
Never the broad leaves of our corn-fields 
Were so beautiful to look on, 
As they seem to us this morning, 
When you come so far to see us." 

How recent! I can seem to scent the 
aroma of the tobacco, as it smoked in rising 
circles from the peace-pipe. I can almost 
whiff of the savory sweetness of the new 
corn steaming in the old brown bowl, the 
chief's brown bowl, waiting for the hungry 
white guest. Could I but leave him there; 
could I but leave them there, around the 
warming fires of the wigwam, giving and 
partaking each of the other's graces. Could 
I have been able to-day to say to all the Ameri- 
can people, as I am able to say to this group, 
there is no debt but the debt of gratitude 

[80 J 



Response — Wy nno gene 



between us, how different had been the 
course of American history. 

But perhaps it has always been so that 
the makers of a nation's glories have been 
individuals; some in statecraft, some in other 
mediums have come to herald new events, 
establish new regimes for the multitudes. 
It is an appreciable fact that to-day it is to 
the free mind of the artist we must turn for 
justice to the American Indian. To him 
we owe the debt of gratitude for establish- 
ing those subtle and most enduring im- 
pressions of an age and a people, which 
the American people, as a people, can only 
comprehend with time. But I am not here 
to unearth the long story of infamies, the 
great tragedy upon which this Moch-Pe-O- 
Zon-Za gazes. Rather I have come to thank 
you for the Indian where great thanks are 
due. 

Who now can misunderstand him who 
stands there against the sky, carved in stone, 
in the mighty truth of him ? What dilettante 
can rob him of his dignity? What ignorance 

[81] 



Response — Wy nno gene 



can abuse him? Aye, what baseness can 
touch him? Calmly he draws his simple 
robe about him and stands there, mute for 
that which has no defense, looking upon the 
nations of men, as they come challenging 
all to all that is lofty in spirit. Perhaps it 
is worth a national tragedy to go down to 
posterity an inspiration to all men. As 
I look upon him for the last, my heart with- 
in me says: Amen; there let him stand, defy- 
ing the very elements, defying injustice, 
defying defeat, so upright, so self-contained, 
so self-sufficient. 

"0 every wind that nods the mountain pine; 
0 aching Time; 0 moments big as years — 
Each, as ye pass, swell out the monstrous truth!" 



[82] 



The Trail Makers 



The Trail Makers 



Mr. Lowden: It is now my good fortune 
to introduce to you one who has been associated 
with this camp from the beginning, Mr. Hamlin 
Garland, who will read an original poem, "The 
Trail Makers". 

Mr. Garland: 

THE TRAIL MAKERS 

(All rights reserved.) 

When from their small, smug fields, in other 
lands, 

Our Pilgrim fathers, minded to be free, 
Set eager feet to alien sands 

Between the forest and the sea, 
They faced the somber, chartless deep 

Of elm and pine, with curious care, 
Timid as wolf-confronted sheep, 

Their hands were bent in piteous prayer. 

To them, the thicket was a snare; 

The red men, Satan's sons of hell; 
Witches rode the midnight air 

And every tarnlet held a spell, 
I 8 5 ] 



The Trail Makers 



And when the west grew dark with rain 
And winds came roaring through the oak 

They longed for home with poignant pain — 
Poor, tender-footed, urban folk! 

Not one knew how to camp or trail, 

Or make his bed down in the snow; 
Not one but seemed foredoomed to fail — 

To each and all the clouds spoke "woe." 
With pious exhortation and repeated pledge 

Their leaders held them, gloomy band, 
Shivering on the land's drab edge — 

There on the pitiless, barren strand. 

Ships came and went. Beneath the cold 

Children sickened, women died, 
And strong men, weakened and grown old, 

Upon their God in anguish cried. 
Shuddering, hopeless, through unending days 

They watched and waited till the suns of 
Spring 

Set all the granite hills ablaze 

And brave brown birds began to sing. 

[86] 



The Trail Makers 



At last the wilderness became a friend. 

Hell's minions brought them meat and corn 
And necessary woodcraft, in the end, 

Conveying knowledge of the snake and 
thorn. 

The sachem gave his peaceful pipe, 
His warm skin coat, his silent shoes, 

And when the wildling fruits were ripe 

The red babes taught them which to choose. 

Adventurous boyhood, quick to trace 

The subtile pathways linking hill and 
stream, 

Explored each camp and fishing-place, 
Hearing with joy the Sagamore's dream. 

Pathless no longer, but generous as fair, 
The wilderness allured to further quest; 

Daring was born in sunset flare, 

A passionate longing for the mystic West. 

Through peace and war, from age to age, 
This red guide wrought the settler to his 
type. 

Inured to toil, contemptuous of the rage 
Of wintry wind, daring the grizzly's gripe, 
[87] 



The Trail Makers 



Behold this grandson of an Oxford clerk, 
With keen, stern eyes and strong, brown 
face, 

Pursuing the wild beast in the dark — 
Master of woodland and the chase. 



Behind him Europe's eager millions pressed, 

Before him fled the bear and deer 
Steady, remorseless, toward the West 

He swept, this newborn pioneer, 
Warring, winning, dying on the way — 

And everywhere the red man's trail he trod 
And everywhere in ruins lay 

The red man's hope, the red man's God. 

One by one, all tribal lines were crossed; 

One by one, opposing chieftains fell. 
Word by word, their very speech was lost, 

Till not one singer lived to tell 
The story of his vanished race. 

The trails they made grew dim with grass, 
And roaring cities filled the place 

Where red-brown maidens loved to pass. 



« 



The Trail Makers 



From Moosatoc to Mitch-i-gan, 

From Iroquois to Northern Cree, 
The lines of conquest broadening ran, 

Till all the world, from sea to sea, 
Was covered by the white man's plow; 

Till, like a chained eagle, desolate and grim, 
The Sitting Bull, with harsh, unyielding brow, 

Fell — and was dust upon the desert's rim. 

With him a whole world vanished, never to 
return, 

An epic world of freedom and the chase. 
No longer may his camp-fires burn, 

By moonlit lake or woodland's space. 
Like exhalations of the rain-wet morn, 

In shuddering thunder, dim and far 
Vanished his buffalo, hoof and horn, 

Before the clanking railway car. 

Aye, they are gone, those "strong, brave men! 

No more the Pawnee sweeps the sod 
On bold, swift raid! Never again 

Shall trail of Kiowa be trod. 

[89] 



The Trail Makers 



Corralled are Cheyenne, Wichita and Ute! 

In scattered huts, debased and grey 
Lakotan singers, sorrowful and mute, 

Await the closing of their bitter day. 

Bloody, braggart, childish — cruel, if you 
will — 

This savage taught our people to be free. 
He kept our poets' hearts a-thrill — 

We swept him from the earth, yet see 
How from our rivers, vales and peaks, 

Like banners, flame the names he gave! 
Monadnock, Alleghany, Shawano, each speaks 

With deathless tongue above his grave. 

Without his legends, wars and creeds, 

Our Nation's story would be thin and dry, 

Our heroes stripped of half their deeds — 
Selfish and mean and small, shall we deny 

So much of justice to their warrior dead? 
Black Hawk, Tecumtha, Roman-Nose — 

Did they not fight for home? Their blood 
was shed 

To check the march of paleface foes. 
[90] 



The Trail Makers 



Guiltless as the panther in our artists' eyes, 

Bold as the Greek in grace of limb, 
His songs, his deeds, his signal cries, 

Shall live in story after him. 
Need made him what he was. As bee 

Or serpent crawls or stings or flies, 
So this man warred at God's decree 

And died beneath unpitying skies. 

And so to-day, freed from all hate and dread, 
Here, midway of the land they fought to 
save, 

We meet in tribute of the storied dead, 
Whose ashes mingle in a common grave. 

To him who died in exile, chieftain still, 
A victim of our greed, with broken heart, 

We raise this sentinel of the hill, 

This splendid symbol of remorseful Art. 

O splendid, vast, primeval land! 

O men of plain and wood and peak! 
To you I raise the signal hand, 

To you I call, for you I speak! 

[91] 



The Trail Makers 



O kingdom of the sunset glade, 

The swift wild horse, the birch canoe, 

For you this halting verse is made, 
To you this statue, over-due. 

Long after our short course is run, 

When not one red-maid's cheek shall glow 
Beneath the kiss of prairie sun, 

When Sauk and Fox and Navajo 
Have merged to one composite race, 

The wondering traveler will scan 
This vast and brooding face, 

And say, "This was the first American." 



[92] 



The Sculptor 



The Sculptor 



(Calls for Mr. Taft.) 

Mr. Lowden: Mr. Lorado Taft. 

Mr. Taft: Ladies and Gentlemen: I 
have had my say — yonder. 

I might add that if ever I did anything 
spontaneously, it was this. It grew out 
of the ground. That is what I hope it may 
suggest. 

It happened in this way: Every evening 
as these shadows turn blue we walk here on 
the bluff. — We have always been very faith- 
ful in going to Mr. Heckman's house several 
times a day, paying gayly our tribute of 
homage and affection, and we have always 
stopped at this point to rest and to enjoy 
the view. This is our fourteenth summer 
here, and it may be that the contemplative 
attitude has become a habit. As we stand 
here we involuntarily fold our arms and the 
pose is that of my Indian — restful, reverent. 

[9SJ 



The Sculptor 



It came over me that generations of men have 
done the same thing right here. And so the 
figure grew out of the attitude, as we stood 
and looked on these beautiful scenes. 

About four years ago I saw some men 
erecting a reinforced concrete chimney at 
the Art Institute, and the thought came to 
me, as I watched them, that by using a plaster 
mold instead of the cylindrical forms, I 
could make a "reinforced concrete" Indian. 

I think I was a little foolhardy or I never 
should have begun it, and I am sure I never 
could have carried it through alone. Good 
fortune sent to my aid Mr. Prasuhn, a young 
sculptor of the Art Institute, who had pre- 
viously done much work as a civil engineer, 
and who knew all about cement. He be- 
came interested in my project and under- 
took the enlargement and the cement work. 
Of the latter I knew nothing and depended 
absolutely upon him. Thus my share in 
the work was practically limited to the six- 
foot model. Mr. Prasuhn occupied him- 
self with the details, and ever since our Colos- 

[96] 



The Sculptor 



sus was started has put in most of his time 
here, often working nights as well as days. 
Late last night I came over, and he was still 
hard at it. Such devotion is certainly rare. 
The statue is a memorial to Mr. Prasuhn, 
as well as to the Indian. I am not sure but 
that my deputy hopes to be buried here. I 
am glad to be able to pay this tribute to him. 

But I am not here to make an oration, 
and anything that I could say would surely 
be an anti-climax after the eloquence to which 
we have listened. 

I want to invite you all to our little settle- 
ment over there. We shall be glad to have 
you see how we live, and to visit during the 
time that remains. 



[97] 



Conclusion 



Mr. Lowden: I just wish to say one word, 
if I may. I know that I voice the senti- 
ment of all who live in this vicinity when 
I say that we feel ourselves under everlast- 
ing obligations for what Mr. Taft has done. 
Some day I trust our children may be able 
to say that this statue, erected on as beau- 
tiful a site as exists anywhere beneath the 
sun, was the beginning of an American 
Barbizon. 

Before I close, I want to read to you a 
few lines from Black Hawk's autobiography. 
I know that all of you who live upon the 
Rock River will quite sympathize with the 
reason which he gives for the war he made 
in this valley. In a speech, when a guest 
of honor of the whites at Fort Madison, 
after the Black Hawk war — and the whites 
of those days were not likely to make as a 
guest of honor a very bad Indian — in 
response to a toast proposed to him he said: 

"It has pleased the Great Spirit that I am here to- 
day. The Earth is our Mother — we are now on it 

[98] 



Conclusion 



with the Great Spirit above us — it is good. I hope 
we are all friends here. A few summers ago I was 
fighting against you. I did wrong, perhaps, but that 
is past — it is buried — let it be forgotten. Rock 
River was a beautiful country. I liked my towns, 
my corn-fields, and the home of my people. I fought 
for it — it is now yours — keep it, as we did." 

I venture to say that there is no one with- 
in the sound of my voice who will fail to 
feel the distinction that this heroic figure 
has given to this scene. It will mark this 
valley long after we are gone. I say again 
that we owe much, not only to Mr. Taft and 
Mr. Heckman, but to the whole camp which 
spends its summers here. I want them to 
know, as I know, that the people of this 
vicinity appreciate their contribution to this 
valley, and wish for them many, many happy 
years. (Applause.) 



[99] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



Lorado Ta 



\ I 7TIEN Art finally established a < 

* ▼ "the new regions of the Midc 
Lorado Taft, one might say, becam« 
missionary- bishop. To preach the 
beauty in partibus infidelium require< 
ness, enthusiasm and a pronounced 
travel. During some ^^yievoi 
gelist ranged active>U^^wti^v^n^^^ 
lay between Pennsylvania and Coloi 
the conversion of heathenesse soon i 
way. Thanks to Mr. Taft, as w.n 
any other agent, the great centra 
of our country has gradually risen tc 



But while Lorac 
of his best years 
that forms so im 
evangel, he has alv 
against being kno 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



WHEN Art finally established a diocese in 
the new regions of the Middle West, 
Lorado Taft, one might say, became its first 
missionary bishop. To preach the gospel of 
beauty in partibus infidelium required earnest- 
ness, enthusiasm and a pronounced taste for 
travel. During some years the devoted evan- 
gelist ranged actively over the virgin tracts that 
lay between Pennsylvania and Colorado, and 
the conversion of heathenesse soon got under 
way. Thanks to Mr. Taft, as much as to 
any other agent, the great central section 
of our country has gradually risen to the con- 
sciousness of beauty, to the toleration of 
beauty, to the appreciation of beauty, and 
to a keener sense of beauty as desirable and 
indispensable. 

But while Lorado Taft gave a good part 
of his best years to the copious discourse 
that forms so important a . feature of any 
evangel, he has always protested, and justly, 
against being known merely as a "talking 

[ 103 ] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



sculptor." While some will say that his 
expenditure of fluent speech, always marked 
by a high seriousness of purpose and a de- 
lightful intimite of manner, was designed 
for the "winning of the West" to art, others, 
fully as well informed, will maintain that 
his two thousand lectures on art subjects 
really supplied the only basis upon which 
the proper work of the practicing artist could 
be securely conducted. There is reward for 
the park fountains, soldiers' monuments and 
portrait busts and statues with which the 
young American sculptor must perforce be- 
gin his public career; but definite remunera- 
tion for the larger and loftier projects which 
are sure to develop in the brain of the matur- 
ing man is much less a certainty — indeed, 
several of Mr. Taft's adventures into the 
ideal have yielded only the recompense that 
comes from a consciousness of having done 
rightly the right thing. Others of them, 
making a special appeal to particular indi- 
viduals or to a particular section of the public, 
have fared more fortunately. Thus, while 

[ 104 ] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



his great groups, "The Solitude of the Soul" 
and "The Blind," have long remained but 
studio pieces, other works, such as the 
"Columbus," at Washington, and the "Foun- 
tain of the Great Lakes," in Chicago, will 
soon fill the public eye and set an indisputable 
seal upon a well-won fame. 

Mr. Taft's missionary days are now past. 
The era of the saddle-bags is over, and the 
word is now preached from a fixed pulpit. 
From the wide and elaborate range of studios 
on the Midway the gospel goes forth with 
as much fervor as in the earlier years spent 
upon the road, and with even a higher de- 
gree of intensification than during his days 
of teaching at the Art Institute and of lectur- 
ing in the extension department of the Univer- 
sity of Chicago. Mr. Taft's instruction has 
possessed a strong creative side. He has 
always had the happy faculty of contriv- 
ing large projets to provide co-operative 
play for the wits and fingers of many students. 
This method has reached even more felicitous 
development since he has enjoyed possession 

[105] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



of his own work-shops and the support of 
a band of selected followers. 

If such advantages are enjoyed at "The 
Midway Studios," they are none the less 
present at his summer quarters, Eagle's 
Nest Camp, on the Rock River, near Oregon, 
Illinois, to which attractive and inspiring 
spot the activities and personnel of The 
Studios are commonly transferred in June. 
It is to this artistic organization, directed 
by one dominant hand and infected from 
one central source of inspiration, that the 
noble figure of " Black Hawk," commemorat- 
ed in the present volume, is due. 

This creation, a notable study of the in- 
terrelations between sculpture and land- 
scape, is, like many other of Mr. Taft's works, 
a monument of disinterestedness. The idea 
came and insisted upon expression. The 
reward is solely in the work itself, and in the 
generous recognition of a friendly public — 
and of that intimate group in which the 
general appreciation finds a nucleus. The 
history of the Statue is one of a generous and 

[106] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



determined lavishing of effort, regardless 
of material reward, on the working out of a 
fine idea to its fullest and best. The char- 
acteristic illustrated here is exhibited almost 
as pointedly in the great Columbus monu- 
ment, now assembling at Washington. To 
complete this conception, in accord with 
his highest promptings, the artist handsome- 
ly added two figures of heroic proportions 
beyond the stipulations and expectations of 
the case; completeness at whatever cost or 
sacrifice. 

The Midway Studios are still fecund of 
ideas. The greatest idea of them all, de- 
signed for the monumental decoration of 
the public parkway between the University 
of Chicago and the Studios themselves, and 
offering one of the most comprehensive 
syntheses of sculpture and landscape archi- 
tecture yet attempted in this country, still 
awaits the favor and patronage that shall 
transform a vast and comprehensive con- 
ception into a concrete reality. Indeed, it 
is projects like this that bring our artist into 

[ 107] 



Lorado Taft: An Appreciation 



direct association with architectural inter- 
ests and sympathies, just as his " History 
of American Sculpture," a genial and thor- 
ough work, published in 1903, brings him 
into close connection with literary interests 
and sympathies. Such are the relationships 
that enlarge the field from which a rich na- 
ture draws still further sustenance. 

In these directions, and in others more 
distinctly civic, is Lorado Taft constantly 
striving for the advance of art and for the 
betterment of general conditions. Indeed, 
it is largely as a citizen, giving freely of his 
best for the common good, that he has taken 
firm hold upon the friendly appreciation of 
his own town, as well as upon that of art- 
lovers throughout the West. 



[108] 



SEP 30 



LB Ja13 



